Sindicatos, associações, clubes, condomínios costumam ser, naturalmente, ambiente diversificados, com todos os tipos de membros, associados, condôminos, frequentadors habituais, enfim, com pessoas das origens as mais diversas, professando religiões diferentes, torcendo para clubes de futebol diferentes, vindos de origens sociais, étnicas e culturais as mais distantes possíveis, e no entanto convivendo sob o mesmo teto ou no mesmo ambiente por razões de conveniência, de escolha, de circunstância.
Num ambiente assim, a aceitação dessa diversidade é de rigor, e a tolerância com posições e posturas diferentes é mesmo obrigatória, com normas respeitadoras dessa diversidade geralmente consolidadas no próprio estatudo de fundação e de funcionamento do clube, entidade, associação.
Assim é que sindicatos ou associações profissionais não costumam ter posições políticas ou sequer afiliações partidárias, deixando a critério de seus membros qualquer decisão a respeito de escolhas que dependem única e exclusivamente de decisões pessoais de cada um.
Apenas na cabeça de um dirigente muito arrogante e autoritário vem a ideia de pretender ditar a atitude dos membros de sua associação.
Pois é isso que está acontecendo na Anpuh, a associação que supostamente representa os professores de história.
Seu presidente tem esse DNA fascista, de pretender que todos os associados pensem como ele.
Transcrevo aqui um trecho do seu manifesto eleitoral, divulgado recentemente, para que se constate o estilo do "coronel" universitário, que de acadêmico só tem o nome, mas não as qualidades:
" Dirijo este texto àqueles que fazem parte como eu desta parcela letrada da sociedade, notadamente, daqueles alojados no interior da Universidade, e que, para minha surpresa e decepção, vêm manifestando a intenção de votar em José Serra no segundo turno das eleições. Como estou escrevendo para pessoas que julgo estar sob o império da racionalidade, nem me vou ocupar de rebater os motivos e argumentos apresentados para não se votar em Dilma Rousseff, em uma das campanhas mais sórdidas, mais caluniosas, injuriosas e preconceituosas já levadas a efeito no país, com a participação decisiva do candidato Serra e da mídia golpista que o apóia, a mídia que medrou e engordou durante a ditadura militar, ..."
Trata-se, manifestamente, de uma ofensa direta a todos os professores que não pensam como ele, pois eles estariam, como direi?, sendo "irracionais", para não dizer reacionários, golpistas, energúnemos e coisas parecidas.
Todo o manifesto partidário do cidadão que infelizmente preside a Anpuh vem escrito nessa linguagem chula, digna de um militante fundamentalista, um terrorista da pena, um intolerante da regras da cidadania, um autocrata de formação.
Acredito que ele consegue, com esse gesto, desconstruir a Anpuh, e desonrar seus estatutos, além de criar um ambiente de trabalho praticamente viciado para o próximo congresso da associação.
Se os membros aplicassem o estatuto com rigor, ele já teria sido automaticamente destituído do cargo. Se continuar apegando-se a ele, não possui, de qualquer forma, autoridade moral para sentar-se na cadeira da presidência.
Meus pêsames aos professores de história que precisam suportar uma personalidade totalitária, vulgar e de má conduta como o seu presidente atual.
Uma desonra para toda a categoria.
Paulo Roberto de Almeida
domingo, 17 de outubro de 2010
Interrupcao eleitoral (7): partidarização academica, Parte A: reitores servis...
Já vimos pior, por certo. Parafraseando Roberto Campos, que disse uma vez que "o Brasil é um país que não perde uma oportunidade de perder oportunidades", eu poderia dizer que a universidade pública brasileira não perde nenhuma oportunidade de afundar cada vez mais na mediocridade, na irrelevância, na partidarização vulgar e na instrumentalização sectária, por parte do baixo clero, obviamente, que neste governo virou alto clero.
Uma outra personalidade política disse algo em torno dos acadêmicos: os competentes se voltariam para o mercado de trabalho, e os incompetentes iam dar aulas. Talvez não seja o caso das ciências duras, mas nas ciências ditas humanas é certamente cada vez mais o caso. Elas são dominadas por aqueles militantes do baixo clero, que arrotam um pouco de gramscismo de ouvido por aqui (já que poucos leram Gramsci, de verdade), mais outro tanto de marxismo vulgar por ali (e bota vulgar nisso: antes era o próprio Marx, depois substituído por Althusser e finalmente por esse estupor da Marta Harnecker), e que não fazem nada a ser arrotar slogans em sala de aula.
Todo esse pessoal está seriamente engajado na campanha presidencial, a começar pelos reitores adesistas que fizeram um manifesto em favor da candidata oficial.
Já tive oportunidade de criticar esses reitores, assim que saiu o malfadado manifesto, reproduzido nas paginas da SBPC, hoje uma associação também tomada pelo partidarismo e pelo servilismo em relação ao poder.
Mandei uma carta para o Jornal da Ciência, mas ela não foi publicada.
Permito-me, portanto, primeiro remeter -- sem pretender fazer propaganda -- ao horroroso manifesto partidários dos reitores, transcrevendo o link onde ele pode ser encontrado, e depois o meu comentário em torno dele.
Manifesto de Reitores das Univ. Federais
EDUCAÇÃO – O BRASIL NO RUMO CERTO
(Manifesto de Reitores das Universidades Federais à Nação Brasileira)
(ler neste link)
Agora, a minha “Carta ao Jornal da Ciência sobre o Manifesto dos Reitores":
Uma outra personalidade política disse algo em torno dos acadêmicos: os competentes se voltariam para o mercado de trabalho, e os incompetentes iam dar aulas. Talvez não seja o caso das ciências duras, mas nas ciências ditas humanas é certamente cada vez mais o caso. Elas são dominadas por aqueles militantes do baixo clero, que arrotam um pouco de gramscismo de ouvido por aqui (já que poucos leram Gramsci, de verdade), mais outro tanto de marxismo vulgar por ali (e bota vulgar nisso: antes era o próprio Marx, depois substituído por Althusser e finalmente por esse estupor da Marta Harnecker), e que não fazem nada a ser arrotar slogans em sala de aula.
Todo esse pessoal está seriamente engajado na campanha presidencial, a começar pelos reitores adesistas que fizeram um manifesto em favor da candidata oficial.
Já tive oportunidade de criticar esses reitores, assim que saiu o malfadado manifesto, reproduzido nas paginas da SBPC, hoje uma associação também tomada pelo partidarismo e pelo servilismo em relação ao poder.
Mandei uma carta para o Jornal da Ciência, mas ela não foi publicada.
Permito-me, portanto, primeiro remeter -- sem pretender fazer propaganda -- ao horroroso manifesto partidários dos reitores, transcrevendo o link onde ele pode ser encontrado, e depois o meu comentário em torno dele.
Manifesto de Reitores das Univ. Federais
EDUCAÇÃO – O BRASIL NO RUMO CERTO
(Manifesto de Reitores das Universidades Federais à Nação Brasileira)
(ler neste link)
Agora, a minha “Carta ao Jornal da Ciência sobre o Manifesto dos Reitores":
Sobre o item: “Reitores de Ifes divulgam manifesto em favor das ações em educação”, acredito que tanto o título quanto o conteúdo desse manifesto estejam essencialmente equivocados, talvez deliberadamente equivocados.
Não se trata de um manifesto em favor de ações, quaisquer que sejam elas, relativas à educação brasileira, mas de uma tomada de posição claramente partidária em favor de uma das candidaturas à cadeira presidencial.
Dispenso-me de comentar o conteúdo, os termos e os posicionamentos desse “manifesto”, diretamente vinculados a uma dessas candidaturas, que revelam, todos eles, a adoção de uma postura maniqueísta, divisionista e, no limite, sectária, de autoridades universitárias que deveriam manter-se independentes, embora não alheias, às escolhas político-eleitorais a que toda a comunidade acadêmica e o povo brasileiros são chamados a fazer neste mês de outubro.
Os reitores sabem muito bem que os universitários, em geral, e os professores em particular, possuem discernimento suficiente para fazer suas próprias opções eleitorais, com base num julgamento autônomo das posturas e propostas eleitorais de cada candidato, e não precisam ser induzidos, em nome de suas instituições, a tomar esta ou aquela atitude. Que esses reitores -- e não todos -- o tenham feito é revelador do ambiente de divisionismo político, e de arregimentação partidária, que tende a fraturar instituições que deveriam estar abertas a todas as propostas políticas de modo tolerante e democrático.
Mais ainda: como autoridades de instituições públicas, estatais em sua maior parte, os reitores deveriam dar o exemplo e se manterem neutros, ou apartidários, nesta conjuntura eleitoral. O fato de que tenham feito uma opção deliberada -- o que é o seu pleno direito no plano cidadão e individual, mas não como reitores -- por uma dessas candidaturas, de modo tão servil quanto ridiculamente publicitário, em favor da candidata oficial do governo Lula, é não apenas lamentável no plano da ética pública, como deplorável no plano da simples relação republicana -- para usar um termo da moda -- que deveria comandar pelo menos isenção quanto às escolhas que a comunidade acadêmica deverá novamente fazer em 31 de outubro.
Trata-se de mais um péssimo exemplo de mobilização de instituições públicas em favor de uma postura político-partidária. Meus cumprimentos aos reitores que não aderiram a esse panfleto eleitoral e meus pêsames, acadêmicos, aos que servilmente o fizeram.
------------------------------
Paulo Roberto Almeida
Japao: da preeminencia ao declinio - New York Times
O jornal NYT está começando uma série de matérias sobre o declínio do Japão. Trata-se de um caso importante na história econômica mundial, dado seu enorme sucesso econômico nos primeiros 80 anos do século 20 (mais até do que o Brasil, que também cresceu bastante, mas não se transformou em nação avançada por lhe faltar educação de massa), seguido, a partir do final dos anos 1980 e início dos 90 pela explosão de suas bolhas imobiliária e financeira e uma notável incapacidade em fazer reformas estruturais que o libertassem da espiral declinista da deflação.
Dstaco apenas um trecho para que se tenha uma ideia da desvalorizao terrível dos ativos japoneses: "Masato, the small-business owner,... sold his four-bedroom condo to a relative for about $185,000, 15 years after buying it for a bit more than $500,000."
Esse é o resultado da rigidez estrutural do mercado de trabalho e das normas que presidem a atividade industrial, financeira e de serviços.
Não se pode pensar que o Brasil está imune a esses problemas: nossa incapacidade de reformar aspectos cruciais da atividade econômica pode nos conduzir ao mesmo resultado, embora com outros componentes.
Paulo Roberto de Almeida
Japan Goes From Dynamic to Disheartened
By MARTIN FACKLER
The New York Times, October 16, 2010
The Great Deflation
Coping With Decline
This is the first in a series of articles that will examine the effects on Japanese society of two decades of economic stagnation and declining prices.
OSAKA, Japan — Like many members of Japan’s middle class, Masato Y. enjoyed a level of affluence two decades ago that was the envy of the world. Masato, a small-business owner, bought a $500,000 condominium, vacationed in Hawaii and drove a late-model Mercedes.
But his living standards slowly crumbled along with Japan’s overall economy. First, he was forced to reduce trips abroad and then eliminate them. Then he traded the Mercedes for a cheaper domestic model. Last year, he sold his condo — for a third of what he paid for it, and for less than what he still owed on the mortgage he took out 17 years ago.
“Japan used to be so flashy and upbeat, but now everyone must live in a dark and subdued way,” said Masato, 49, who asked that his full name not be used because he still cannot repay the $110,000 that he owes on the mortgage.
Few nations in recent history have seen such a striking reversal of economic fortune as Japan. The original Asian success story, Japan rode one of the great speculative stock and property bubbles of all time in the 1980s to become the first Asian country to challenge the long dominance of the West.
But the bubbles popped in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and Japan fell into a slow but relentless decline that neither enormous budget deficits nor a flood of easy money has reversed. For nearly a generation now, the nation has been trapped in low growth and a corrosive downward spiral of prices, known as deflation, in the process shriveling from an economic Godzilla to little more than an afterthought in the global economy.
Now, as the United States and other Western nations struggle to recover from a debt and property bubble of their own, a growing number of economists are pointing to Japan as a dark vision of the future. Even as the Federal Reserve chairman, Ben S. Bernanke, prepares a fresh round of unconventional measures to stimulate the economy, there are growing fears that the United States and many European economies could face a prolonged period of slow growth or even, in the worst case, deflation, something not seen on a sustained basis outside Japan since the Great Depression.
Many economists remain confident that the United States will avoid the stagnation of Japan, largely because of the greater responsiveness of the American political system and Americans’ greater tolerance for capitalism’s creative destruction. Japanese leaders at first denied the severity of their nation’s problems and then spent heavily on job-creating public works projects that only postponed painful but necessary structural changes, economists say.
“We’re not Japan,” said Robert E. Hall, a professor of economics at Stanford. “In America, the bet is still that we will somehow find ways to get people spending and investing again.”
Still, as political pressure builds to reduce federal spending and budget deficits, other economists are now warning of “Japanification” — of falling into the same deflationary trap of collapsed demand that occurs when consumers refuse to consume, corporations hold back on investments and banks sit on cash. It becomes a vicious, self-reinforcing cycle: as prices fall further and jobs disappear, consumers tighten their purse strings even more and companies cut back on spending and delay expansion plans.
“The U.S., the U.K., Spain, Ireland, they all are going through what Japan went through a decade or so ago,” said Richard Koo, chief economist at Nomura Securities who recently wrote a book about Japan’s lessons for the world. “Millions of individuals and companies see their balance sheets going underwater, so they are using their cash to pay down debt instead of borrowing and spending.”
Just as inflation scarred a generation of Americans, deflation has left a deep imprint on the Japanese, breeding generational tensions and a culture of pessimism, fatalism and reduced expectations. While Japan remains in many ways a prosperous society, it faces an increasingly grim situation, particularly outside the relative economic vibrancy of Tokyo, and its situation provides a possible glimpse into the future for the United States and Europe, should the most dire forecasts come to pass.
Scaled-Back Ambitions
The downsizing of Japan’s ambitions can be seen on the streets of Tokyo, where concrete “microhouses” have become popular among younger Japanese who cannot afford even the famously cramped housing of their parents, or lack the job security to take out a traditional multidecade loan.
These matchbox-size homes stand on plots of land barely large enough to park a sport utility vehicle, yet have three stories of closet-size bedrooms, suitcase-size closets and a tiny kitchen that properly belongs on a submarine.
“This is how to own a house even when you are uneasy about the future,” said Kimiyo Kondo, general manager at Zaus, a Tokyo-based company that builds microhouses.
For many people under 40, it is hard to grasp just how far this is from the 1980s, when a mighty — and threatening — “Japan Inc.” seemed ready to obliterate whole American industries, from automakers to supercomputers. With the Japanese stock market quadrupling and the yen rising to unimagined heights, Japan’s companies dominated global business, gobbling up trophy properties like Hollywood movie studios (Universal Studios and Columbia Pictures), famous golf courses (Pebble Beach) and iconic real estate (Rockefeller Center).
In 1991, economists were predicting that Japan would overtake the United States as the world’s largest economy by 2010. In fact, Japan’s economy remains the same size it was then: a gross domestic product of $5.7 trillion at current exchange rates. During the same period, the United States economy doubled in size to $14.7 trillion, and this year China overtook Japan to become the world’s No. 2 economy.
China has so thoroughly eclipsed Japan that few American intellectuals seem to bother with Japan now, and once crowded Japanese-language classes at American universities have emptied. Even Clyde V. Prestowitz, a former Reagan administration trade negotiator whose writings in the 1980s about Japan’s threat to the United States once stirred alarm in Washington, said he was now studying Chinese. “I hardly go to Japan anymore,” Mr. Prestowitz said.
The decline has been painful for the Japanese, with companies and individuals like Masato having lost the equivalent of trillions of dollars in the stock market, which is now just a quarter of its value in 1989, and in real estate, where the average price of a home is the same as it was in 1983. And the future looks even bleaker, as Japan faces the world’s largest government debt — around 200 percent of gross domestic product — a shrinking population and rising rates of poverty and suicide.
But perhaps the most noticeable impact here has been Japan’s crisis of confidence. Just two decades ago, this was a vibrant nation filled with energy and ambition, proud to the point of arrogance and eager to create a new economic order in Asia based on the yen. Today, those high-flying ambitions have been shelved, replaced by weariness and fear of the future, and an almost stifling air of resignation. Japan seems to have pulled into a shell, content to accept its slow fade from the global stage.
Its once voracious manufacturers now seem prepared to surrender industry after industry to hungry South Korean and Chinese rivals. Japanese consumers, who once flew by the planeload on flashy shopping trips to Manhattan and Paris, stay home more often now, saving their money for an uncertain future or setting new trends in frugality with discount brands like Uniqlo.
As living standards in this still wealthy nation slowly erode, a new frugality is apparent among a generation of young Japanese, who have known nothing but economic stagnation and deflation. They refuse to buy big-ticket items like cars or televisions, and fewer choose to study abroad in America.
Japan’s loss of gumption is most visible among its young men, who are widely derided as “herbivores” for lacking their elders’ willingness to toil for endless hours at the office, or even to succeed in romance, which many here blame, only half jokingly, for their country’s shrinking birthrate. “The Japanese used to be called economic animals,” said Mitsuo Ohashi, former chief executive officer of the chemicals giant Showa Denko. “But somewhere along the way, Japan lost its animal spirits.”
When asked in dozens of interviews about their nation’s decline, Japanese, from policy makers and corporate chieftains to shoppers on the street, repeatedly mention this startling loss of vitality. While Japan suffers from many problems, most prominently the rapid graying of its society, it is this decline of a once wealthy and dynamic nation into a deep social and cultural rut that is perhaps Japan’s most ominous lesson for the world today.
The classic explanation of the evils of deflation is that it makes individuals and businesses less willing to use money, because the rational way to act when prices are falling is to hold onto cash, which gains in value. But in Japan, nearly a generation of deflation has had a much deeper effect, subconsciously coloring how the Japanese view the world. It has bred a deep pessimism about the future and a fear of taking risks that make people instinctively reluctant to spend or invest, driving down demand — and prices — even further.
“A new common sense appears, in which consumers see it as irrational or even foolish to buy or borrow,” said Kazuhisa Takemura, a professor at Waseda University in Tokyo who has studied the psychology of deflation.
A Deflated City
While the effects are felt across Japan’s economy, they are more apparent in regions like Osaka, the third-largest city, than in relatively prosperous Tokyo. In this proudly commercial city, merchants have gone to extremes to coax shell-shocked shoppers into spending again. But this often takes the shape of price wars that end up only feeding Japan’s deflationary spiral.
There are vending machines that sell canned drinks for 10 yen, or 12 cents; restaurants with 50-yen beer; apartments with the first month’s rent of just 100 yen, about $1.22. Even marriage ceremonies are on sale, with discount wedding halls offering weddings for $600 — less than a tenth of what ceremonies typically cost here just a decade ago.
On Senbayashi, an Osaka shopping street, merchants recently held a 100-yen day, offering much of their merchandise for that price. Even then, they said, the results were disappointing.
“It’s like Japanese have even lost the desire to look good,” said Akiko Oka, 63, who works part time in a small apparel shop, a job she has held since her own clothing store went bankrupt in 2002.
This loss of vigor is sometimes felt in unusual places. Kitashinchi is Osaka’s premier entertainment district, a three-centuries-old playground where the night is filled with neon signs and hostesses in tight dresses, where just taking a seat at a top club can cost $500.
But in the past 15 years, the number of fashionable clubs and lounges has shrunk to 480 from 1,200, replaced by discount bars and chain restaurants. Bartenders say the clientele these days is too cost-conscious to show the studied disregard for money that was long considered the height of refinement.
“A special culture might be vanishing,” said Takao Oda, who mixes perfectly crafted cocktails behind the glittering gold countertop at his Bar Oda.
After years of complacency, Japan appears to be waking up to its problems, as seen last year when disgruntled voters ended the virtual postwar monopoly on power of the Liberal Democratic Party. However, for many Japanese, it may be too late. Japan has already created an entire generation of young people who say they have given up on believing that they can ever enjoy the job stability or rising living standards that were once considered a birthright here.
Yukari Higaki, 24, said the only economic conditions she had ever known were ones in which prices and salaries seemed to be in permanent decline. She saves as much money as she can by buying her clothes at discount stores, making her own lunches and forgoing travel abroad. She said that while her generation still lived comfortably, she and her peers were always in a defensive crouch, ready for the worst.
“We are the survival generation,” said Ms. Higaki, who works part time at a furniture store.
Hisakazu Matsuda, president of Japan Consumer Marketing Research Institute, who has written several books on Japanese consumers, has a different name for Japanese in their 20s; he calls them the consumption-haters. He estimates that by the time this generation hits their 60s, their habits of frugality will have cost the Japanese economy $420 billion in lost consumption.
“There is no other generation like this in the world,” Mr. Matsuda said. “These guys think it’s stupid to spend.”
Deflation has also affected businesspeople by forcing them to invent new ways to survive in an economy where prices and profits only go down, not up.
Yoshinori Kaiami was a real estate agent in Osaka, where, like the rest of Japan, land prices have been falling for most of the past 19 years. Mr. Kaiami said business was tough. There were few buyers in a market that was virtually guaranteed to produce losses, and few sellers, because most homeowners were saddled with loans that were worth more than their homes.
Some years ago, he came up with an idea to break the gridlock. He created a company that guides homeowners through an elaborate legal subterfuge in which they erase the original loan by declaring personal bankruptcy, but continue to live in their home by “selling” it to a relative, who takes out a smaller loan to pay its greatly reduced price.
“If we only had inflation again, this sort of business would not be necessary,” said Mr. Kaiami, referring to the rising prices that are the opposite of deflation. “I feel like I’ve been waiting for 20 years for inflation to come back.”
One of his customers was Masato, the small-business owner, who sold his four-bedroom condo to a relative for about $185,000, 15 years after buying it for a bit more than $500,000. He said he was still deliberating about whether to expunge the $110,000 he still owed his bank by declaring personal bankruptcy.
Economists said one reason deflation became self-perpetuating was that it pushed companies and people like Masato to survive by cutting costs and selling what they already owned, instead of buying new goods or investing.
“Deflation destroys the risk-taking that capitalist economies need in order to grow,” said Shumpei Takemori, an economist at Keio University in Tokyo. “Creative destruction is replaced with what is just destructive destruction.”
Steve Lohr contributed reporting from New York.
Dstaco apenas um trecho para que se tenha uma ideia da desvalorizao terrível dos ativos japoneses: "Masato, the small-business owner,... sold his four-bedroom condo to a relative for about $185,000, 15 years after buying it for a bit more than $500,000."
Esse é o resultado da rigidez estrutural do mercado de trabalho e das normas que presidem a atividade industrial, financeira e de serviços.
Não se pode pensar que o Brasil está imune a esses problemas: nossa incapacidade de reformar aspectos cruciais da atividade econômica pode nos conduzir ao mesmo resultado, embora com outros componentes.
Paulo Roberto de Almeida
Japan Goes From Dynamic to Disheartened
By MARTIN FACKLER
The New York Times, October 16, 2010
The Great Deflation
Coping With Decline
This is the first in a series of articles that will examine the effects on Japanese society of two decades of economic stagnation and declining prices.
OSAKA, Japan — Like many members of Japan’s middle class, Masato Y. enjoyed a level of affluence two decades ago that was the envy of the world. Masato, a small-business owner, bought a $500,000 condominium, vacationed in Hawaii and drove a late-model Mercedes.
But his living standards slowly crumbled along with Japan’s overall economy. First, he was forced to reduce trips abroad and then eliminate them. Then he traded the Mercedes for a cheaper domestic model. Last year, he sold his condo — for a third of what he paid for it, and for less than what he still owed on the mortgage he took out 17 years ago.
“Japan used to be so flashy and upbeat, but now everyone must live in a dark and subdued way,” said Masato, 49, who asked that his full name not be used because he still cannot repay the $110,000 that he owes on the mortgage.
Few nations in recent history have seen such a striking reversal of economic fortune as Japan. The original Asian success story, Japan rode one of the great speculative stock and property bubbles of all time in the 1980s to become the first Asian country to challenge the long dominance of the West.
But the bubbles popped in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and Japan fell into a slow but relentless decline that neither enormous budget deficits nor a flood of easy money has reversed. For nearly a generation now, the nation has been trapped in low growth and a corrosive downward spiral of prices, known as deflation, in the process shriveling from an economic Godzilla to little more than an afterthought in the global economy.
Now, as the United States and other Western nations struggle to recover from a debt and property bubble of their own, a growing number of economists are pointing to Japan as a dark vision of the future. Even as the Federal Reserve chairman, Ben S. Bernanke, prepares a fresh round of unconventional measures to stimulate the economy, there are growing fears that the United States and many European economies could face a prolonged period of slow growth or even, in the worst case, deflation, something not seen on a sustained basis outside Japan since the Great Depression.
Many economists remain confident that the United States will avoid the stagnation of Japan, largely because of the greater responsiveness of the American political system and Americans’ greater tolerance for capitalism’s creative destruction. Japanese leaders at first denied the severity of their nation’s problems and then spent heavily on job-creating public works projects that only postponed painful but necessary structural changes, economists say.
“We’re not Japan,” said Robert E. Hall, a professor of economics at Stanford. “In America, the bet is still that we will somehow find ways to get people spending and investing again.”
Still, as political pressure builds to reduce federal spending and budget deficits, other economists are now warning of “Japanification” — of falling into the same deflationary trap of collapsed demand that occurs when consumers refuse to consume, corporations hold back on investments and banks sit on cash. It becomes a vicious, self-reinforcing cycle: as prices fall further and jobs disappear, consumers tighten their purse strings even more and companies cut back on spending and delay expansion plans.
“The U.S., the U.K., Spain, Ireland, they all are going through what Japan went through a decade or so ago,” said Richard Koo, chief economist at Nomura Securities who recently wrote a book about Japan’s lessons for the world. “Millions of individuals and companies see their balance sheets going underwater, so they are using their cash to pay down debt instead of borrowing and spending.”
Just as inflation scarred a generation of Americans, deflation has left a deep imprint on the Japanese, breeding generational tensions and a culture of pessimism, fatalism and reduced expectations. While Japan remains in many ways a prosperous society, it faces an increasingly grim situation, particularly outside the relative economic vibrancy of Tokyo, and its situation provides a possible glimpse into the future for the United States and Europe, should the most dire forecasts come to pass.
Scaled-Back Ambitions
The downsizing of Japan’s ambitions can be seen on the streets of Tokyo, where concrete “microhouses” have become popular among younger Japanese who cannot afford even the famously cramped housing of their parents, or lack the job security to take out a traditional multidecade loan.
These matchbox-size homes stand on plots of land barely large enough to park a sport utility vehicle, yet have three stories of closet-size bedrooms, suitcase-size closets and a tiny kitchen that properly belongs on a submarine.
“This is how to own a house even when you are uneasy about the future,” said Kimiyo Kondo, general manager at Zaus, a Tokyo-based company that builds microhouses.
For many people under 40, it is hard to grasp just how far this is from the 1980s, when a mighty — and threatening — “Japan Inc.” seemed ready to obliterate whole American industries, from automakers to supercomputers. With the Japanese stock market quadrupling and the yen rising to unimagined heights, Japan’s companies dominated global business, gobbling up trophy properties like Hollywood movie studios (Universal Studios and Columbia Pictures), famous golf courses (Pebble Beach) and iconic real estate (Rockefeller Center).
In 1991, economists were predicting that Japan would overtake the United States as the world’s largest economy by 2010. In fact, Japan’s economy remains the same size it was then: a gross domestic product of $5.7 trillion at current exchange rates. During the same period, the United States economy doubled in size to $14.7 trillion, and this year China overtook Japan to become the world’s No. 2 economy.
China has so thoroughly eclipsed Japan that few American intellectuals seem to bother with Japan now, and once crowded Japanese-language classes at American universities have emptied. Even Clyde V. Prestowitz, a former Reagan administration trade negotiator whose writings in the 1980s about Japan’s threat to the United States once stirred alarm in Washington, said he was now studying Chinese. “I hardly go to Japan anymore,” Mr. Prestowitz said.
The decline has been painful for the Japanese, with companies and individuals like Masato having lost the equivalent of trillions of dollars in the stock market, which is now just a quarter of its value in 1989, and in real estate, where the average price of a home is the same as it was in 1983. And the future looks even bleaker, as Japan faces the world’s largest government debt — around 200 percent of gross domestic product — a shrinking population and rising rates of poverty and suicide.
But perhaps the most noticeable impact here has been Japan’s crisis of confidence. Just two decades ago, this was a vibrant nation filled with energy and ambition, proud to the point of arrogance and eager to create a new economic order in Asia based on the yen. Today, those high-flying ambitions have been shelved, replaced by weariness and fear of the future, and an almost stifling air of resignation. Japan seems to have pulled into a shell, content to accept its slow fade from the global stage.
Its once voracious manufacturers now seem prepared to surrender industry after industry to hungry South Korean and Chinese rivals. Japanese consumers, who once flew by the planeload on flashy shopping trips to Manhattan and Paris, stay home more often now, saving their money for an uncertain future or setting new trends in frugality with discount brands like Uniqlo.
As living standards in this still wealthy nation slowly erode, a new frugality is apparent among a generation of young Japanese, who have known nothing but economic stagnation and deflation. They refuse to buy big-ticket items like cars or televisions, and fewer choose to study abroad in America.
Japan’s loss of gumption is most visible among its young men, who are widely derided as “herbivores” for lacking their elders’ willingness to toil for endless hours at the office, or even to succeed in romance, which many here blame, only half jokingly, for their country’s shrinking birthrate. “The Japanese used to be called economic animals,” said Mitsuo Ohashi, former chief executive officer of the chemicals giant Showa Denko. “But somewhere along the way, Japan lost its animal spirits.”
When asked in dozens of interviews about their nation’s decline, Japanese, from policy makers and corporate chieftains to shoppers on the street, repeatedly mention this startling loss of vitality. While Japan suffers from many problems, most prominently the rapid graying of its society, it is this decline of a once wealthy and dynamic nation into a deep social and cultural rut that is perhaps Japan’s most ominous lesson for the world today.
The classic explanation of the evils of deflation is that it makes individuals and businesses less willing to use money, because the rational way to act when prices are falling is to hold onto cash, which gains in value. But in Japan, nearly a generation of deflation has had a much deeper effect, subconsciously coloring how the Japanese view the world. It has bred a deep pessimism about the future and a fear of taking risks that make people instinctively reluctant to spend or invest, driving down demand — and prices — even further.
“A new common sense appears, in which consumers see it as irrational or even foolish to buy or borrow,” said Kazuhisa Takemura, a professor at Waseda University in Tokyo who has studied the psychology of deflation.
A Deflated City
While the effects are felt across Japan’s economy, they are more apparent in regions like Osaka, the third-largest city, than in relatively prosperous Tokyo. In this proudly commercial city, merchants have gone to extremes to coax shell-shocked shoppers into spending again. But this often takes the shape of price wars that end up only feeding Japan’s deflationary spiral.
There are vending machines that sell canned drinks for 10 yen, or 12 cents; restaurants with 50-yen beer; apartments with the first month’s rent of just 100 yen, about $1.22. Even marriage ceremonies are on sale, with discount wedding halls offering weddings for $600 — less than a tenth of what ceremonies typically cost here just a decade ago.
On Senbayashi, an Osaka shopping street, merchants recently held a 100-yen day, offering much of their merchandise for that price. Even then, they said, the results were disappointing.
“It’s like Japanese have even lost the desire to look good,” said Akiko Oka, 63, who works part time in a small apparel shop, a job she has held since her own clothing store went bankrupt in 2002.
This loss of vigor is sometimes felt in unusual places. Kitashinchi is Osaka’s premier entertainment district, a three-centuries-old playground where the night is filled with neon signs and hostesses in tight dresses, where just taking a seat at a top club can cost $500.
But in the past 15 years, the number of fashionable clubs and lounges has shrunk to 480 from 1,200, replaced by discount bars and chain restaurants. Bartenders say the clientele these days is too cost-conscious to show the studied disregard for money that was long considered the height of refinement.
“A special culture might be vanishing,” said Takao Oda, who mixes perfectly crafted cocktails behind the glittering gold countertop at his Bar Oda.
After years of complacency, Japan appears to be waking up to its problems, as seen last year when disgruntled voters ended the virtual postwar monopoly on power of the Liberal Democratic Party. However, for many Japanese, it may be too late. Japan has already created an entire generation of young people who say they have given up on believing that they can ever enjoy the job stability or rising living standards that were once considered a birthright here.
Yukari Higaki, 24, said the only economic conditions she had ever known were ones in which prices and salaries seemed to be in permanent decline. She saves as much money as she can by buying her clothes at discount stores, making her own lunches and forgoing travel abroad. She said that while her generation still lived comfortably, she and her peers were always in a defensive crouch, ready for the worst.
“We are the survival generation,” said Ms. Higaki, who works part time at a furniture store.
Hisakazu Matsuda, president of Japan Consumer Marketing Research Institute, who has written several books on Japanese consumers, has a different name for Japanese in their 20s; he calls them the consumption-haters. He estimates that by the time this generation hits their 60s, their habits of frugality will have cost the Japanese economy $420 billion in lost consumption.
“There is no other generation like this in the world,” Mr. Matsuda said. “These guys think it’s stupid to spend.”
Deflation has also affected businesspeople by forcing them to invent new ways to survive in an economy where prices and profits only go down, not up.
Yoshinori Kaiami was a real estate agent in Osaka, where, like the rest of Japan, land prices have been falling for most of the past 19 years. Mr. Kaiami said business was tough. There were few buyers in a market that was virtually guaranteed to produce losses, and few sellers, because most homeowners were saddled with loans that were worth more than their homes.
Some years ago, he came up with an idea to break the gridlock. He created a company that guides homeowners through an elaborate legal subterfuge in which they erase the original loan by declaring personal bankruptcy, but continue to live in their home by “selling” it to a relative, who takes out a smaller loan to pay its greatly reduced price.
“If we only had inflation again, this sort of business would not be necessary,” said Mr. Kaiami, referring to the rising prices that are the opposite of deflation. “I feel like I’ve been waiting for 20 years for inflation to come back.”
One of his customers was Masato, the small-business owner, who sold his four-bedroom condo to a relative for about $185,000, 15 years after buying it for a bit more than $500,000. He said he was still deliberating about whether to expunge the $110,000 he still owed his bank by declaring personal bankruptcy.
Economists said one reason deflation became self-perpetuating was that it pushed companies and people like Masato to survive by cutting costs and selling what they already owned, instead of buying new goods or investing.
“Deflation destroys the risk-taking that capitalist economies need in order to grow,” said Shumpei Takemori, an economist at Keio University in Tokyo. “Creative destruction is replaced with what is just destructive destruction.”
Steve Lohr contributed reporting from New York.
Diplomacia filantropica: as fundacoes americanas
Um livro sobre o mundo pouco conhecido das grandes fundações americanas que buscaram acomodar os interesses do Império:
Ludovic Tournès (sous la dir.):
L'argent de l'influence : Les fondations américaines et leurs réseaux européens
(Paris, Autrement, collection mémoires/culture, 208 p., 18 euros)
Présentation:
Du début du XXe siècle à la chute du mur de Berlin, les grandes fondations philanthropiques américaines (Carnegie, Rockefeller, Ford, puis Soros) n'ont pas cessé d'être présentes en Europe et d'y tisser de multiples réseaux dans les milieux intellectuels, scientifiques et politiques. Fondées par de grands industriels symboles du capitalisme américain, ces fondations sont à la fois porteuses d'un projet de société libérale et partisanes d¹une régulation des excès du capitalisme. Du fait de ces objectifs contradictoires, la nature de leurs actions en Europe dépend du contexte géopolitique : avant 1914 et pendant l'entre-deux-guerres, elles jouent le rôle de ciment entre les milieux pacifistes européens et américains ; avec la guerre froide, elles embrassent la bannière de la lutte contre le communisme. Présentes là où l'État américain ne l'est pas encore, ne l'est plus ou ne veut pas l'être officiellement, elles occupent une place à part dans la diplomatie américaine, dont elles ne contredisent jamais formellement les orientations, mais par rapport à laquelle elles s'accordent un degré d'indépendance plus ou moins important selon le contexte international. L'ouvrage met en scène la diversité des actions des fondations américaines en Europe tout au long du XXe siècle. Alors que leur fonctionnement et leurs objectifs restent souvent objet de fantasmes, on les verra opérer sur le terrain et constituer des réseaux denses et durables.
Ludovic Tournès, coordinateur de l'ouvrage, est professeur d'histoire des relations internationales à l'université Paris Ouest Nanterre La défense.
Avec la collaboration de Frédéric Attal, Kenneth Bertrams, Diane Dosso, Nicolas Guilhot, Helke Rausch, Pierre-Yves Saunier, Marie Scot.
Table des matières:
Introduction
Carnegie, Rockefeller, Ford, Soros : Généalogie de la toile philanthropique
Chapitre 1
La Dotation Carnegie pour la paix internationale et l'invention de la diplomatie philanthropique (1880-1914).
Chapitre 2
De l'action humanitaire à la recherche scientifique : Belgique, 1914-1930
Chapitre 3
Rockefeller, Gillet, Lépine and Co.: une joint venture transatlantique à Lyon (1918-1940)
Chapitre 4
"Rockefeller's Baby": la London School of Economics et la recherche économique dans l¹Angleterre de l¹entre-deux-guerres
Chapitre 5
La deuxième guerre mondiale et l'exode des scientifiques aux Etats-Unis
chapitre 6
"Allemagne, année zéro"? Dénazifier et démocratiser (1945-1955)
Chapitre 7
Reconstruire l'Europe intellectuelle : les sciences sociales en Italie, 1945-1970
Chapitre 8
"Un réseau d¹amitiés agissantes": les deux vies de la Fondation pour une entraide intellectuelle européenne (1957-1991)
Conclusion
Entre soft power et société civile : un siècle de diplomatie philanthropique en Europe
Ludovic Tournès (sous la dir.):
L'argent de l'influence : Les fondations américaines et leurs réseaux européens
(Paris, Autrement, collection mémoires/culture, 208 p., 18 euros)
Présentation:
Du début du XXe siècle à la chute du mur de Berlin, les grandes fondations philanthropiques américaines (Carnegie, Rockefeller, Ford, puis Soros) n'ont pas cessé d'être présentes en Europe et d'y tisser de multiples réseaux dans les milieux intellectuels, scientifiques et politiques. Fondées par de grands industriels symboles du capitalisme américain, ces fondations sont à la fois porteuses d'un projet de société libérale et partisanes d¹une régulation des excès du capitalisme. Du fait de ces objectifs contradictoires, la nature de leurs actions en Europe dépend du contexte géopolitique : avant 1914 et pendant l'entre-deux-guerres, elles jouent le rôle de ciment entre les milieux pacifistes européens et américains ; avec la guerre froide, elles embrassent la bannière de la lutte contre le communisme. Présentes là où l'État américain ne l'est pas encore, ne l'est plus ou ne veut pas l'être officiellement, elles occupent une place à part dans la diplomatie américaine, dont elles ne contredisent jamais formellement les orientations, mais par rapport à laquelle elles s'accordent un degré d'indépendance plus ou moins important selon le contexte international. L'ouvrage met en scène la diversité des actions des fondations américaines en Europe tout au long du XXe siècle. Alors que leur fonctionnement et leurs objectifs restent souvent objet de fantasmes, on les verra opérer sur le terrain et constituer des réseaux denses et durables.
Ludovic Tournès, coordinateur de l'ouvrage, est professeur d'histoire des relations internationales à l'université Paris Ouest Nanterre La défense.
Avec la collaboration de Frédéric Attal, Kenneth Bertrams, Diane Dosso, Nicolas Guilhot, Helke Rausch, Pierre-Yves Saunier, Marie Scot.
Table des matières:
Introduction
Carnegie, Rockefeller, Ford, Soros : Généalogie de la toile philanthropique
Chapitre 1
La Dotation Carnegie pour la paix internationale et l'invention de la diplomatie philanthropique (1880-1914).
Chapitre 2
De l'action humanitaire à la recherche scientifique : Belgique, 1914-1930
Chapitre 3
Rockefeller, Gillet, Lépine and Co.: une joint venture transatlantique à Lyon (1918-1940)
Chapitre 4
"Rockefeller's Baby": la London School of Economics et la recherche économique dans l¹Angleterre de l¹entre-deux-guerres
Chapitre 5
La deuxième guerre mondiale et l'exode des scientifiques aux Etats-Unis
chapitre 6
"Allemagne, année zéro"? Dénazifier et démocratiser (1945-1955)
Chapitre 7
Reconstruire l'Europe intellectuelle : les sciences sociales en Italie, 1945-1970
Chapitre 8
"Un réseau d¹amitiés agissantes": les deux vies de la Fondation pour une entraide intellectuelle européenne (1957-1991)
Conclusion
Entre soft power et société civile : un siècle de diplomatie philanthropique en Europe
sábado, 16 de outubro de 2010
China detona sua primeira bomba nuclear: 16/10/1064
On Oct. 16, 1964, China detonated its first atomic bomb.
China Tests Atomic Bomb, Asks Summit Talk On Ban; Johnson Minimizes Peril
By SEYMOUR TOPPING
The New York Times, October 16, 1964
U.S. Is Denounced Peking Says Purpose of Test Is to Defend Peace of World U.S. Is Denounced as Peace Threat Peking Pledges It Will Not Be First to Use Weapon- Parley Aim Discounted
RELATED HEADLINES
Johnson Minimizes Peril: He Sees 'Tragedy': Calls Costs Too Great for Chinese, Though Weapon Is Crude
Hong Kong, Oct. 16--Communist China announced tonight that it had exploded its first atom bomb. Peking pledged that it would never be the first to use nuclear weapons in the future.
A communique stated that a nuclear test was successfully conducted at 3 P.M. Peking time (3 A.M., Eastern daylight time) in the western region of China. No details were disclosed. [In Washington, the test site was reported to be in Sinkiang, a province bordering the Soviet Union.]
"The success of China's nuclear test is a major achievement of the Chinese people in the strengthening of their national defense and the safeguarding of their motherland as well as a major contribution by the Chinese people to the cause of the defense of world peace," the communique asserted.
An accompanying Government statement declared that the purpose of developing nuclear weapons was to protect the Chinese people "from the danger of the United States' launching a nuclear war."
Excesses Ruled Out
"On the question of nuclear weapons, China will commit neither the error of adventurism, nor the error of capitulation," the statement said. "The Chinese people can be trusted."
The Peking statement formally proposed to the governments of the world that a universal summit conference be convened to discuss the question of a complete prohibition on and the thorough destruction of nuclear weapons.
It said that as a first step the summit conference "should reach agreement to the effect that the nuclear powers and those countries which will soon become nuclear powers undertake not to use them against nonnuclear countries and nuclear-free zones nor against each other."
The proposal was dismissed by Western observers here as propaganda. The terms do not allow for practical negotiations with a view to reaching specific agreements, they commented.
Although Communist China became the world's fifth nuclear nation, following the United States, the Soviet Union, Britain and France, specialists here doubted that it had the capability of becoming a first-class military power during this decade.
The principal advantage accruing to it immediately is psychological and political. The entry of the first nonwhite nation into the exclusive "nuclear club" was regarded here as certain to have a strong impact on the peoples of Asia and Africa despite United States efforts to prepare them for Peking's accomplishment.
Western experts have estimated that it will take several years before the Chinese can build a delivery system. The withdrawal of Soviet military aid in 1960 disrupted Peking's program to develop ballistic missiles and left its air force largely obsolescent.
Altogether, this has been a triumphant day for Communist China.
The nuclear test was successfully carried out less than 12 hours after the announcement that Nikita S. Khrushchev, ideological arch-enemy of Peking, had been ousted from the leadership of the Soviet party and Government.
Greetings Sent to Brezhnev
Mao Tse-tung, chairman of the Chinese Communist party, and other top leaders, extended "warm greetings" in a message to Leonid I. Brezhnev, the new Soviet party leader; Aleksei N. Kosygin, the new Premier, and Anastas I. Mikoyan, President, who retained his office.
A cautiously worded Chinese message avoided mentioning Mr. Khrushchev or any outstanding issues. However, it concluded with a series of exhortations that analysts here viewed as an invitation to a new attempt at some kind of rapprochement. The message said:
"May the Chinese and Soviet parties and the two countries unite on the basis of Marxism- Leninism and proletarian internationalism!
"May the fraternal, unbreakable friendship between the Chinese and Soviet peoples continuously develop!
"May the Chinese and Soviet peoples win one victory after another in their common struggled against imperialism headed by the United States and for the defense of world peace!"
Wishes for Soviet Success
The message also expressed the hope that the Soviet party and Government "will achieve new successes in their construction work in all fields and in the struggle for the defense of world peace."
The signers of the message were Mr. Mao; Liu Shao-chi, President; Marshal Chu Teh, chairman of the Standing Committee of the National Peoples' Congress, and Chou En-lai, Premier.
Specialists on Soviet relations believe that the imminence of the detonation of the Chinese bomb was a factor in the decision by the Central Committee Wednesday to remove Mr. Khrushchev. A majority of the Soviet leadership evidently decided, for tactical reasons, at least, to adopt a more flexible attitude toward Communist China.
The Italian and Rumanian and many other parties have been opposed to any move to exclude the Chinese from the international movement. The imminent nuclear test was certain to give more weight to their views.
The analysts said that a formal split in the international Communist movement had been postponed and possibly averted by the ouster of Mr. Khrushchev.
The texts of the Moscow announcements were published this morning in Peking newspapers without comment. Jenmin Jih Pao, official organ, which carried the announcements under the headline "Kruschev Steps Down," subordinated them to a report on the cotton industry.
There was no expectation among analysts here that the change in Moscow would lead to any early settlement of the fundamental issues between Moscow and Peking. Divergencies of both ideological and national interests have become so profound that no quick solution is regarded as possible.
As part of the day's triumphs, the Labor victory in Britain was certain to please the Chinese Communists. Harold Wilson, the new British Prime Minister, has favored an improvement of relations with Peking and the detonation of its bomb was thought likely to reinforce his attitude.
The United States has opposed any disarmament agreement that would ban nuclear weapons without concurrent restrictions on conventional arms. Confronted by a Chinese Communist Army of two and a half million men, the United States, in defending Southeast Asia or Taiwan, would have to depend on its nuclear arsenal to curb aggression.
The Chinese statement obviously was intended to reassure the nonaligned nations, which have expressed misgivings about Peking's failure to adhere to the nuclear test ban treaty signed in Moscow last summer by the United States, Britain and the Soviet Union.
The statement described the treaty as a "big fraud" to fool the world about attempts by the signatories to consolidate their nuclear monopoly.
>The statement reiterated the thesis of Mao Tse-tung, chairman of the Chinese Communist party, that the "atom bomb is a paper tiger" and that people, not weapons, decide wars. It said that aim of Communist China in developing nuclear weapons was "to break the nuclear monopoly of the nuclear powers and to eliminate nuclear weapons."
Hsinhua, the Chinese Communist press agency, reported that Mr. Mao and other leaders received more than a thousand young people, who sang and danced in a performance entitled "The East Glows Red."
OTHER HEADLINES
Pravda Says Khrushchev Is Harebrained Schemer; Gives West Peace Pledge: Policies Outlined: New Chiefs Promise to Continue Efforts for 'Coexistence'
Brezhnev Urged End of China Rift
Johnson Briefed:Exchanges Messages With New Leaders -- Sees Dobrynin
Wilson Is Prime Minister; Labor Has 4-Seat Margin:New Leader Sees a Complete Mandate Despite Narrow Majority -- He Names Defeated Aide Foreign Secretary
Secret Service Had Jenkins File: Knew in 1961 of His First Arrest but Told No One -- Johnson Orders Inquiry
Rome Authorizes Changes in Mass: Under Revisions Advanced by Council, Priests Are to Face the Congregation
Blue Cross Found Near Bankruptcy: Court Upholds Rate Rise to Help Bar Its Collapse
Wagner Backs Plan For Improving Port
Berra Out as Manager; Keane Quits Cards: St. Louis Manager Turns in Notice Dated Sept. 28
Signs About Jenkins Draw Ire of Johnson
Pay Pacts Scored by Treasury Aide: Accords 'Probably Too Big' This Year, Roosa Says
China Tests Atomic Bomb, Asks Summit Talk On Ban; Johnson Minimizes Peril
By SEYMOUR TOPPING
The New York Times, October 16, 1964
U.S. Is Denounced Peking Says Purpose of Test Is to Defend Peace of World U.S. Is Denounced as Peace Threat Peking Pledges It Will Not Be First to Use Weapon- Parley Aim Discounted
RELATED HEADLINES
Johnson Minimizes Peril: He Sees 'Tragedy': Calls Costs Too Great for Chinese, Though Weapon Is Crude
Hong Kong, Oct. 16--Communist China announced tonight that it had exploded its first atom bomb. Peking pledged that it would never be the first to use nuclear weapons in the future.
A communique stated that a nuclear test was successfully conducted at 3 P.M. Peking time (3 A.M., Eastern daylight time) in the western region of China. No details were disclosed. [In Washington, the test site was reported to be in Sinkiang, a province bordering the Soviet Union.]
"The success of China's nuclear test is a major achievement of the Chinese people in the strengthening of their national defense and the safeguarding of their motherland as well as a major contribution by the Chinese people to the cause of the defense of world peace," the communique asserted.
An accompanying Government statement declared that the purpose of developing nuclear weapons was to protect the Chinese people "from the danger of the United States' launching a nuclear war."
Excesses Ruled Out
"On the question of nuclear weapons, China will commit neither the error of adventurism, nor the error of capitulation," the statement said. "The Chinese people can be trusted."
The Peking statement formally proposed to the governments of the world that a universal summit conference be convened to discuss the question of a complete prohibition on and the thorough destruction of nuclear weapons.
It said that as a first step the summit conference "should reach agreement to the effect that the nuclear powers and those countries which will soon become nuclear powers undertake not to use them against nonnuclear countries and nuclear-free zones nor against each other."
The proposal was dismissed by Western observers here as propaganda. The terms do not allow for practical negotiations with a view to reaching specific agreements, they commented.
Although Communist China became the world's fifth nuclear nation, following the United States, the Soviet Union, Britain and France, specialists here doubted that it had the capability of becoming a first-class military power during this decade.
The principal advantage accruing to it immediately is psychological and political. The entry of the first nonwhite nation into the exclusive "nuclear club" was regarded here as certain to have a strong impact on the peoples of Asia and Africa despite United States efforts to prepare them for Peking's accomplishment.
Western experts have estimated that it will take several years before the Chinese can build a delivery system. The withdrawal of Soviet military aid in 1960 disrupted Peking's program to develop ballistic missiles and left its air force largely obsolescent.
Altogether, this has been a triumphant day for Communist China.
The nuclear test was successfully carried out less than 12 hours after the announcement that Nikita S. Khrushchev, ideological arch-enemy of Peking, had been ousted from the leadership of the Soviet party and Government.
Greetings Sent to Brezhnev
Mao Tse-tung, chairman of the Chinese Communist party, and other top leaders, extended "warm greetings" in a message to Leonid I. Brezhnev, the new Soviet party leader; Aleksei N. Kosygin, the new Premier, and Anastas I. Mikoyan, President, who retained his office.
A cautiously worded Chinese message avoided mentioning Mr. Khrushchev or any outstanding issues. However, it concluded with a series of exhortations that analysts here viewed as an invitation to a new attempt at some kind of rapprochement. The message said:
"May the Chinese and Soviet parties and the two countries unite on the basis of Marxism- Leninism and proletarian internationalism!
"May the fraternal, unbreakable friendship between the Chinese and Soviet peoples continuously develop!
"May the Chinese and Soviet peoples win one victory after another in their common struggled against imperialism headed by the United States and for the defense of world peace!"
Wishes for Soviet Success
The message also expressed the hope that the Soviet party and Government "will achieve new successes in their construction work in all fields and in the struggle for the defense of world peace."
The signers of the message were Mr. Mao; Liu Shao-chi, President; Marshal Chu Teh, chairman of the Standing Committee of the National Peoples' Congress, and Chou En-lai, Premier.
Specialists on Soviet relations believe that the imminence of the detonation of the Chinese bomb was a factor in the decision by the Central Committee Wednesday to remove Mr. Khrushchev. A majority of the Soviet leadership evidently decided, for tactical reasons, at least, to adopt a more flexible attitude toward Communist China.
The Italian and Rumanian and many other parties have been opposed to any move to exclude the Chinese from the international movement. The imminent nuclear test was certain to give more weight to their views.
The analysts said that a formal split in the international Communist movement had been postponed and possibly averted by the ouster of Mr. Khrushchev.
The texts of the Moscow announcements were published this morning in Peking newspapers without comment. Jenmin Jih Pao, official organ, which carried the announcements under the headline "Kruschev Steps Down," subordinated them to a report on the cotton industry.
There was no expectation among analysts here that the change in Moscow would lead to any early settlement of the fundamental issues between Moscow and Peking. Divergencies of both ideological and national interests have become so profound that no quick solution is regarded as possible.
As part of the day's triumphs, the Labor victory in Britain was certain to please the Chinese Communists. Harold Wilson, the new British Prime Minister, has favored an improvement of relations with Peking and the detonation of its bomb was thought likely to reinforce his attitude.
The United States has opposed any disarmament agreement that would ban nuclear weapons without concurrent restrictions on conventional arms. Confronted by a Chinese Communist Army of two and a half million men, the United States, in defending Southeast Asia or Taiwan, would have to depend on its nuclear arsenal to curb aggression.
The Chinese statement obviously was intended to reassure the nonaligned nations, which have expressed misgivings about Peking's failure to adhere to the nuclear test ban treaty signed in Moscow last summer by the United States, Britain and the Soviet Union.
The statement described the treaty as a "big fraud" to fool the world about attempts by the signatories to consolidate their nuclear monopoly.
>The statement reiterated the thesis of Mao Tse-tung, chairman of the Chinese Communist party, that the "atom bomb is a paper tiger" and that people, not weapons, decide wars. It said that aim of Communist China in developing nuclear weapons was "to break the nuclear monopoly of the nuclear powers and to eliminate nuclear weapons."
Hsinhua, the Chinese Communist press agency, reported that Mr. Mao and other leaders received more than a thousand young people, who sang and danced in a performance entitled "The East Glows Red."
OTHER HEADLINES
Pravda Says Khrushchev Is Harebrained Schemer; Gives West Peace Pledge: Policies Outlined: New Chiefs Promise to Continue Efforts for 'Coexistence'
Brezhnev Urged End of China Rift
Johnson Briefed:Exchanges Messages With New Leaders -- Sees Dobrynin
Wilson Is Prime Minister; Labor Has 4-Seat Margin:New Leader Sees a Complete Mandate Despite Narrow Majority -- He Names Defeated Aide Foreign Secretary
Secret Service Had Jenkins File: Knew in 1961 of His First Arrest but Told No One -- Johnson Orders Inquiry
Rome Authorizes Changes in Mass: Under Revisions Advanced by Council, Priests Are to Face the Congregation
Blue Cross Found Near Bankruptcy: Court Upholds Rate Rise to Help Bar Its Collapse
Wagner Backs Plan For Improving Port
Berra Out as Manager; Keane Quits Cards: St. Louis Manager Turns in Notice Dated Sept. 28
Signs About Jenkins Draw Ire of Johnson
Pay Pacts Scored by Treasury Aide: Accords 'Probably Too Big' This Year, Roosa Says
Custo de internet no Brasil: somos extorquidos
O brasileiro tem uma renda per capita 7 vezes inferior à dos americanos, e no entanto paga 7 vezes mais para se conectar.
A razão?: carteis, monopolios, impostos, tudo isso alimentado pelo governo...
Paulo Roberto de Almeida
Com preço médio de R$ 199, Brasil é um dos que cobram mais pela banda larga
Fernando Braga
Correio Braziliense Online, 16.10.2010
A forte valorização do real, aliada à pesada tributação de até 40% sobre a banda larga móvel no Brasil, faz com que o país divida com o Zimbábue o topo da lista das nações com a internet mais cara do planeta. Nos dois países, o preço médio cobrado pelo serviço de terceira geração (3G), com velocidade de 2,1 megabytes por segundo (Mpbs), é de R$ 199. Com isso, os brasileiros pagam muito mais pelo acesso à rede que usuários de nações sem muita expressão no cenário mundial, como Congo, Haiti e Bangladesh. Levantamento da Conferência das Nações Unidas sobre Comércio e Desenvolvimento (Unctad) mostra que o valor médio mundial registrado para planos semelhantes é de R$ 77,48.
"Notamos uma enorme variação, com alguns países oferecendo esse serviço por menos de R$ 33,30 por mês, enquanto outros cobram mais de R$ 166,50", afirma o estudo da Unctad, produzido sobre países considerados emergentes. Os números fazem parte de um trabalho global sobre como o uso da tecnologia da informação pode contribuir para combater a pobreza ao redor do mundo. Na visão do organismo internacional, os governos de nações em desenvolvimento deveriam dar mais importância ao setor de tecnologia e comunicação a fim de reduzir a desigualdade social.
Caso houvesse mais estímulos para a criação de empresas de pequena escala, sugere a pesquisa, mais benefícios poderiam ser divididos pelas populações dessas regiões. "Microempresas estão crescendo rapidamente em países de baixa renda e podem oferecer empregos, o que gera um valor real aos cidadãos que dispõem de menos recursos e educação. Essas atividades incluem a compra e venda de computadores, a manutenção e conserto de PCs (personal computers) e o gerenciamento de lan houses", detalha o estudo.
Salto
A Unctad lembra, contudo, que poucos países em desenvolvimento mostram-se envolvidos na criação de serviços para a área da tecnologia da informação (TI). "As exportações estão geograficamente muito concentradas. Na China, de longe o maior exportador do ramo, pudemos notar uma contribuição significativa da fabricação desses produtos, que acabou atingindo positivamente a renda dos mais pobres." Todavia, mesmo com preços tão altos quando comparados aos de países desenvolvidos, o Brasil continua registrando um vertiginoso crescimento no número de acessos à internet móvel. Somente no primeiro semestre de 2010, foram 11,9 milhões de conexões via 3G, ultrapassando o volume de 11,8 milhões de usuários de serviços de banda larga fixa (cabo, fibra óptica e rede de telefonia).
Os dados divulgados pela fabricante de equipamentos de rede Huawei e pela consultoria Teleco apontam que nos três primeiros meses de 2010 houve 4,9 milhões de novos acessos móveis. Segundo a pesquisa, o crescimento da internet móvel brasileira está relacionado à baixa cobertura oferecida por serviços fixos e pelo aumento do interesse dos consumidores por celulares compatíveis com a tecnologia 3G. Em um ano, esses produtos venderam quase seis vezes mais.
=================
Brasileiro paga uma das maiores tarifas do mundo para ter internet no celular
Da Redação
O Globo, 16.10.2010
O custo de pacotes de dados para celular no Brasil é o mais caro entre os países pobres e em desenvolvimento, segundo estudo da Organização das Nações Unidas, com informações compiladas pela Nokia Siemens. De acordo com o levantamento, que cita dados de 2009, apenas no Brasil e no Zimbábue o preço médio do pacote de dados mensal passa de US$ 120.
Com isso, o Brasil fica atrás de países como Congo, Haiti e Bangladesh — este, o menor custo entre as 78 nações listadas no Relatório de Economia da Informação da Conferência das Nações Unidas sobre Comércio e Desenvolvimento (Unctad). O custo médio mundial é de US$ 46,54 mensais.
O Brasil também tem um custo muito superior ao de seus vizinhos do Mercosul. No Paraguai, o custo médio fica abaixo de US$ 20, enquanto Argentina e Uruguai estão em torno de US$ 50, pouco acima da média mundial.
A Unctad considera, no estudo, o custo total de um pacote de tráfego de 2,1 megabytes (MB) de dados por mês, com 165 minutos de voz e 174 torpedos.
preço baixo, diz Unctad O estudo aponta ainda que o acesso móvel à internet vem crescendo significativamente nos países em desenvolvimento, o que se deve, em grande parte, ao fato de os celulares serem bem mais baratos que os computadores. Na Ásia, afirma a Unctad, os dois maiores emergentes confirmam essa tendência.
“O número desses usuários na China atingiu 233 milhões em dezembro de 2009, uma alta de 50% em um ano. Segundo dados oficiais, a Índia tinha 127 milhões de usuários de dados sem fio em setembro de 2009, um avanço de 44% em um ano”.
As assinaturas de celular devem atingir cinco bilhões este ano — quase um por pessoa em todo o planeta, segundo o secretário-geral da Unctad, Supachai Panitchpakdi.
Nos países industrializados, a penetração dos celulares já superou 100%, com muitas pessoas tendo mais de um aparelho ou assinatura. Nas nações em desenvolvimento, o percentual de assinaturas hoje é de 58%, enquanto nos países mais pobres está em apenas 25%.
A Unctad lembra, no entanto, que esse acesso móvel à internet tem um peso maior para os mais pobres. “Na maioria dos países, as tarifas do serviço pré-pago são mais elevados que as do pós-pago, o que significa que os mais pobres pagam mais pelo celular que os assinantes mais abonados dos planos pós-pagos”.
A chave para o uso bemsucedido do celular é a redução de seu custo, argumenta a Unctad, algo que muitos países africanos ainda ignoram.
— A Índia mostrou-nos o caminho para tornar o celular o mais barato possível, de forma que todos tenham acesso a esse tipo de equipamento — disse Supachai.
“Enquanto as operadoras de muitos outros grandes emergentes obtêm receita de tarifas elevadas e volume reduzido, na Índia a receita é gerada usando tarifas baixas e volume elevado”, argumenta a Unctad.
O resultado, diz, é que o usuário médio na Índia fala muito mais tempo ao celular que os de outros países.
O mercado indiano também se destaca por seu baixo custo.
As operadoras locais criaram modelos de negócios e estruturas que lhes permitiram lucrar com consumidores que gastam pouco. Segundo a Unctad, a Índia tem uma das menores receitas médias por usuário do mundo (abaixo de US$ 5), enquanto em Angola esta atinge US$ 25.
Tecnologia da informação pode reduzir pobreza O objetivo da Unctad foi mostrar que o uso de tecnologia da informação pode contribuir no combate à pobreza no mundo. O organismo defende que os governos dos países em desenvolvimento deem mais importância ao setor de tecnologia da informação e comunicação na estratégia de redução da pobreza.
“Microempresas estão crescendo rapidamente em países de baixa renda e podem oferecer emprego de valor real à população com menos recursos e educação. Essas atividades incluem uso de aparelhos e reparos, manutenção de computadores pessoais e gerenciamento de lan houses”, afirma a Unctad no relatório.
Mas o documento lembra que poucos países em desenvolvimento estão envolvidos na fabricação e criação de serviços para a área. “As exportações de bens de tecnologia estão geograficamente muito concentradas. Na China, de longe o maior exportador do ramo, houve contribuição significativa da produção para a renda dos mais pobres”.
A razão?: carteis, monopolios, impostos, tudo isso alimentado pelo governo...
Paulo Roberto de Almeida
Com preço médio de R$ 199, Brasil é um dos que cobram mais pela banda larga
Fernando Braga
Correio Braziliense Online, 16.10.2010
A forte valorização do real, aliada à pesada tributação de até 40% sobre a banda larga móvel no Brasil, faz com que o país divida com o Zimbábue o topo da lista das nações com a internet mais cara do planeta. Nos dois países, o preço médio cobrado pelo serviço de terceira geração (3G), com velocidade de 2,1 megabytes por segundo (Mpbs), é de R$ 199. Com isso, os brasileiros pagam muito mais pelo acesso à rede que usuários de nações sem muita expressão no cenário mundial, como Congo, Haiti e Bangladesh. Levantamento da Conferência das Nações Unidas sobre Comércio e Desenvolvimento (Unctad) mostra que o valor médio mundial registrado para planos semelhantes é de R$ 77,48.
"Notamos uma enorme variação, com alguns países oferecendo esse serviço por menos de R$ 33,30 por mês, enquanto outros cobram mais de R$ 166,50", afirma o estudo da Unctad, produzido sobre países considerados emergentes. Os números fazem parte de um trabalho global sobre como o uso da tecnologia da informação pode contribuir para combater a pobreza ao redor do mundo. Na visão do organismo internacional, os governos de nações em desenvolvimento deveriam dar mais importância ao setor de tecnologia e comunicação a fim de reduzir a desigualdade social.
Caso houvesse mais estímulos para a criação de empresas de pequena escala, sugere a pesquisa, mais benefícios poderiam ser divididos pelas populações dessas regiões. "Microempresas estão crescendo rapidamente em países de baixa renda e podem oferecer empregos, o que gera um valor real aos cidadãos que dispõem de menos recursos e educação. Essas atividades incluem a compra e venda de computadores, a manutenção e conserto de PCs (personal computers) e o gerenciamento de lan houses", detalha o estudo.
Salto
A Unctad lembra, contudo, que poucos países em desenvolvimento mostram-se envolvidos na criação de serviços para a área da tecnologia da informação (TI). "As exportações estão geograficamente muito concentradas. Na China, de longe o maior exportador do ramo, pudemos notar uma contribuição significativa da fabricação desses produtos, que acabou atingindo positivamente a renda dos mais pobres." Todavia, mesmo com preços tão altos quando comparados aos de países desenvolvidos, o Brasil continua registrando um vertiginoso crescimento no número de acessos à internet móvel. Somente no primeiro semestre de 2010, foram 11,9 milhões de conexões via 3G, ultrapassando o volume de 11,8 milhões de usuários de serviços de banda larga fixa (cabo, fibra óptica e rede de telefonia).
Os dados divulgados pela fabricante de equipamentos de rede Huawei e pela consultoria Teleco apontam que nos três primeiros meses de 2010 houve 4,9 milhões de novos acessos móveis. Segundo a pesquisa, o crescimento da internet móvel brasileira está relacionado à baixa cobertura oferecida por serviços fixos e pelo aumento do interesse dos consumidores por celulares compatíveis com a tecnologia 3G. Em um ano, esses produtos venderam quase seis vezes mais.
=================
Brasileiro paga uma das maiores tarifas do mundo para ter internet no celular
Da Redação
O Globo, 16.10.2010
O custo de pacotes de dados para celular no Brasil é o mais caro entre os países pobres e em desenvolvimento, segundo estudo da Organização das Nações Unidas, com informações compiladas pela Nokia Siemens. De acordo com o levantamento, que cita dados de 2009, apenas no Brasil e no Zimbábue o preço médio do pacote de dados mensal passa de US$ 120.
Com isso, o Brasil fica atrás de países como Congo, Haiti e Bangladesh — este, o menor custo entre as 78 nações listadas no Relatório de Economia da Informação da Conferência das Nações Unidas sobre Comércio e Desenvolvimento (Unctad). O custo médio mundial é de US$ 46,54 mensais.
O Brasil também tem um custo muito superior ao de seus vizinhos do Mercosul. No Paraguai, o custo médio fica abaixo de US$ 20, enquanto Argentina e Uruguai estão em torno de US$ 50, pouco acima da média mundial.
A Unctad considera, no estudo, o custo total de um pacote de tráfego de 2,1 megabytes (MB) de dados por mês, com 165 minutos de voz e 174 torpedos.
preço baixo, diz Unctad O estudo aponta ainda que o acesso móvel à internet vem crescendo significativamente nos países em desenvolvimento, o que se deve, em grande parte, ao fato de os celulares serem bem mais baratos que os computadores. Na Ásia, afirma a Unctad, os dois maiores emergentes confirmam essa tendência.
“O número desses usuários na China atingiu 233 milhões em dezembro de 2009, uma alta de 50% em um ano. Segundo dados oficiais, a Índia tinha 127 milhões de usuários de dados sem fio em setembro de 2009, um avanço de 44% em um ano”.
As assinaturas de celular devem atingir cinco bilhões este ano — quase um por pessoa em todo o planeta, segundo o secretário-geral da Unctad, Supachai Panitchpakdi.
Nos países industrializados, a penetração dos celulares já superou 100%, com muitas pessoas tendo mais de um aparelho ou assinatura. Nas nações em desenvolvimento, o percentual de assinaturas hoje é de 58%, enquanto nos países mais pobres está em apenas 25%.
A Unctad lembra, no entanto, que esse acesso móvel à internet tem um peso maior para os mais pobres. “Na maioria dos países, as tarifas do serviço pré-pago são mais elevados que as do pós-pago, o que significa que os mais pobres pagam mais pelo celular que os assinantes mais abonados dos planos pós-pagos”.
A chave para o uso bemsucedido do celular é a redução de seu custo, argumenta a Unctad, algo que muitos países africanos ainda ignoram.
— A Índia mostrou-nos o caminho para tornar o celular o mais barato possível, de forma que todos tenham acesso a esse tipo de equipamento — disse Supachai.
“Enquanto as operadoras de muitos outros grandes emergentes obtêm receita de tarifas elevadas e volume reduzido, na Índia a receita é gerada usando tarifas baixas e volume elevado”, argumenta a Unctad.
O resultado, diz, é que o usuário médio na Índia fala muito mais tempo ao celular que os de outros países.
O mercado indiano também se destaca por seu baixo custo.
As operadoras locais criaram modelos de negócios e estruturas que lhes permitiram lucrar com consumidores que gastam pouco. Segundo a Unctad, a Índia tem uma das menores receitas médias por usuário do mundo (abaixo de US$ 5), enquanto em Angola esta atinge US$ 25.
Tecnologia da informação pode reduzir pobreza O objetivo da Unctad foi mostrar que o uso de tecnologia da informação pode contribuir no combate à pobreza no mundo. O organismo defende que os governos dos países em desenvolvimento deem mais importância ao setor de tecnologia da informação e comunicação na estratégia de redução da pobreza.
“Microempresas estão crescendo rapidamente em países de baixa renda e podem oferecer emprego de valor real à população com menos recursos e educação. Essas atividades incluem uso de aparelhos e reparos, manutenção de computadores pessoais e gerenciamento de lan houses”, afirma a Unctad no relatório.
Mas o documento lembra que poucos países em desenvolvimento estão envolvidos na fabricação e criação de serviços para a área. “As exportações de bens de tecnologia estão geograficamente muito concentradas. Na China, de longe o maior exportador do ramo, houve contribuição significativa da produção para a renda dos mais pobres”.
A piada da semana: postalistas nao recebem cartas pelo correio...
Essa é impagável: os trabalhadores dos correios dos EUA, que enviaram seus votos pelo correio, tiveram a grata surpresa de saber que eles foram perdidos...
The Postal Service Can't Afford Unions
by Tad DeHaven
The Daily Caller, October 12, 2010
If you believe in a higher power, then I've got evidence for you that God has a sense of humor. Last week, the American Postal Workers Union, which represents more than 200,000 workers, had to extend its elections for national officers because ... wait for it ... thousands of ballots got lost in the mail.
Tad DeHaven is a budget analyst at the Cato Institute and co-editor of Downsizing Government.org
The Postal Service Can't Afford Unions
by Tad DeHaven
The Daily Caller, October 12, 2010
If you believe in a higher power, then I've got evidence for you that God has a sense of humor. Last week, the American Postal Workers Union, which represents more than 200,000 workers, had to extend its elections for national officers because ... wait for it ... thousands of ballots got lost in the mail.
Tad DeHaven is a budget analyst at the Cato Institute and co-editor of Downsizing Government.org
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